


Wisps

by fatalize



Category: Shoujo Kakumei Utena | Revolutionary Girl Utena
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-22
Updated: 2015-02-22
Packaged: 2018-03-13 15:47:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3387371
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fatalize/pseuds/fatalize
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“A dream, huh…maybe this is all a dream, and we only exist in dreams together.” Maybe we dream so we can meet, because this is the only world we can meet in. Maybe we dream to escape our coffins, our fragile weed-tangled prisons in lonely, dusty backyards.</p><p>Utena awakens in an old abandoned house, but she's not all there, translucent as a ghost--and with her is another girl, just as transparent as she is, who she knows is named Himemiya.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Wisps

**Author's Note:**

> I finished watching Utena the other day and it wrecked me so hard I had to write a fic. ;v;
> 
> That being said, I'm fairly new to this series, so I apologize if something like this has been done before. I hope you enjoy it, regardless!

Perhaps she dreamed too much of princes, of rose-petal kisses and knights in shining armor atop porcelain-white horses; perhaps she dreamed in a flowery haze, thinking of soft silent exchanges of love, unspoken agreements and tender touches on king-sized beds in the highest castle towers.

Perhaps she simply dreamed too much, caught up in her quiet fantasies too often, wearing delusions like armor to protect and prolong her daydreams. A fairytale heroine, a luminous lover, a champion of the era—she was none of these. Not at the moment, anyway.

But perhaps, someday…

 

* * *

 

She opens her eyes to find herself in an ashen doll-room, shelves of the delicate girls clinging to the walls, dust dancing in the dim sunlight that peeks out of the half-open window. The room’s a dull brown-gray, like an old photo—everything is washed-out and decrepit, from the wood-paneling to the doll dresses to the unmade bed to her very self.

Although the color of her hands may have more to do with the fact that they’re transparent rather than dull. Translucent would be a mild way to put it; in reality, she isn't there at all, not even a lung or liver to show that this is somehow still a body. If anything, she's like a projector-screen image, an outward appearance of what once was with little substance beyond the 2-D visual displayed.

The first question that pops in her mind is:  _Where am I?  
_ Followed by the second:  _Why am I like this?  
_ And the third:  _Who am I, anyway?_

The dolls around her face the walls. 

Besides them, there is a sallow vanity missing a mirror, with empty drawers. Everything in the room is hollow with nothingness. 

But despite the disorient, her nerves aren't rattled, although she  _feels_  like they should be, and feels like she should be concerned about the fact that she can't remember how she got here, much less anything else. Her focus is off-kilter, not on her memory or her origins.

Instead: the door.

Moving toward the white-chipped frame, she wonders briefly if she can grab the handle with hands that don’t feel, but finds she passes through it easily enough—and why wouldn’t she with a body like this?

The hallway before her is just as dusty and dull as the room she left behind, and somehow emptier, with no furniture or photographs to line it. Only at the end of the hall does something lie, something small and white, something that would otherwise be insignificant if not for the lack of anything else around.

She moves forward and finds her feet glide fairly easily across the rough wooden floors. Lowering her body she discovers that the white object is a piece of paper, or rather, a note, with something scrawled on it in delicate cursive:

_The Sunlit Garden._

A faint smile finds its way to her lips, and a fleeting feeling lingers in her mind; nostalgia, she knows it’s called, but can’t quite recall what about the three simple words stirs up a certain feeling inside her.

Or at least, a memory of a feeling. She’s not sure if the form she currently has permits her to feel anything real at all.

To her right are some stairs, gracefully carved but in none too good of shape, like the rest of the house. She decides to follow them down, wondering if she’ll find a way outside, perhaps to an actual sunlit garden where something may be discovered.

At the bottom of the stairs is a door, but her instincts tell her that that door’s not the right one (whatever "the right one" is), so she turns left down another hall into a small kitchen with basic appliances—a stove, a sink, cabinets—but otherwise empty.

 _Empty, empty,_ she thinks. _Doesn’t anyone live here? Or do I live here? And I’ve become like the house?_

_Or the house has become like me?_

Towards the back of the kitchen is a slider door, and this door she feels compelled to walk towards. She reaches for the handle before remembering she doesn’t have to, and passes through it easily.

Outside it’s cloudy, only a sliver of sun peeking through the knotted wisps of gray. A quick sweep of the area tells her there’s no garden, either—at least, no garden that’s flourishing, but with all the rest she’s seen, she wasn’t expecting much.

What does surprise her, though, is the girl. Towards the back of the yard is someone as translucent as her, sitting on a black chair next to another empty seat, facing a rather large clump of dead flowers and weeds, what she presumes to be what once was a garden.

As she moves closer she starts to notice that there is something underneath the tangle of plants— _two_ somethings, in fact. One is long and wooden, rotted in places, the other completely made of glass. Two coffins, with two names, although she can’t read them for the vines. But something about the wooden one feels familiar, almost…the memory of nostalgia wells up in her again, so much so she swears she feels a twinge of pain, and then, a word—a name—

“Himemiya…”

The girl on the black chair slowly turns her head to her. With a spark of emotion in her eyes, her lips wrap themselves around a word, like a lover’s arms lacing their way around a body they know well but haven’t touched in weeks, and tenderly she whispers, “Utena…?”

 _Utena. That’s my name,_ she suddenly remembers, but more than the recollection of her own name, she’s taken in by the ghost-girl— _Himemiya,_ she repeats to herself this time—in front of her, her delicate stature and wavy dark hair, and although they’re both colorless for the most part, there’s something breathtaking in the eyes behind her glasses, and she catches herself staring for perhaps a moment too long before she speaks.

“Ah, it’s pretty dreary around here isn’t it?” she says, taking the empty seat. “Were you just sitting out here all by yourself?”

Himemiya looks at her as if she’s still grasping the fact that Utena is _there_ , that her apparition isn’t just a figment of her imagination. In a cloud-soft voice, she says, “I think I was waiting for you.”

“Eh? For me?” Utena points to herself, slightly shocked. “Well, I guess there’s not really anyone else around here…”

A pause; and then, looking at the coffins, Himemiya says, “I woke up in that house alone, but felt like I was missing something, so I came out here, and found these. I knew I didn’t need two, and the other one must be for someone else. So I waited here for you.”

Utena’s gaze drifts back to the coffins; the glass one, she somehow knows, is for her. The wooden one, for Himemiya. Covered in intertwining vines.

But if the coffins were here, and they were theirs, should they be in them?

“Hey, Himemiya…” Utena says her name, and there’s something about the way it rolls off her tongue that feels pleasant, like her mouth was made to call her. “Do you remember how you got here? Or where we are?”

“Not a thing,” Himemiya replies, although she doesn’t appear to be too perturbed by that fact. “I didn’t even know my name until you came.”

“Me, too,” Utena admits.

An empty sullen house, with nothing but barely-there girls and a few broken down objects—something feels off; not only that there is something missing but that there is something she should be worried about, something she desperately needs to remember but can’t no matter how hard she tries to bring it to the surface.

She only knows this: she feels completely pulled in by Himemiya’s presence.

They sit out here on these chairs, in front of death-beds bearing their names, blocked out by the overgrown flora. Utena’s mind floats back to the note—where that had come from was a mystery, too. “Doesn’t really bring to mind the image of a ‘sunlit garden,’” she observes.

Himemiya brightens, as much as a transparent image of a person can, smiling gently at Utena. “Oh? I know a piece of music by that name. I could play it for you on the piano someday, if you’d like.”

Utena smiles warmly in return. “If we can find a piano, I’d like that, someday.”

“A private concert just for you.”

“It’s only the two of us together here, after all.”

“We can do anything you wish here, together.”

“Yeah. And maybe someday, together…”

“Someday, together…?”

The words fall back down her throat, and she forgets them almost as soon a she swallows them. Utena stands up. “Would you like some tea?”

 

* * *

 

The dawn of the next morning Utena awakens to the sound of piano music. She furrows her brow, perplexed. She and Himemiya had explored the house yesterday after making tea, (finding that the only thing present in the kitchen were, by chance, tea leaves, a working stove, and running water—the house seemed to only provide the barest minimum), and found the rest of the house to be, as first thought, broken and empty. How could a piano appear overnight?

She lifts herself out from the bed, glancing at the clocks that now decorate the walls, each of them telling her a different time, but finding she cared not which one was accurate—time doesn’t matter here to her, at least not when she is with the other girl.

Before leaving the room, she inspects the mirror-less vanity again, checking the drawers and finding a simple white rose. _How pretty,_ she observes, and without thinking, reaches for it, and to her surprise, is able to grab it, despite her fingers having no solid form. Carefully, she reaches for the door handle, and again to her surprise, it opens. Could she have done that yesterday, too, if she tried?

She follows the hallway, with its deep brown wood paneling and drab vignettes, downstairs, and turning right, enters the living room and finds Himemiya sitting on a black piano bench, focused with a certain professional-like air, though Utena detects a tinge of sadness in her playing.

_How pretty…_

Utena waits until Himemiya finishes, and placing the white rose lightly on the top of the piano, says, “That was really soothing, Himemiya. Although it sounded a little…sad.”

“Did it? That was not my intention,” Himemiya replies.

“Was that ‘The Sunlit Garden’? That piano piece you like?”

“It was. I know it by heart.”

Utena thinks of the melody, the feeling it brought to her; of a pair of gentle arms circling her body, of pale sunlight and dew-drop flowers. It really was a lovely piece, but it didn’t quite feel like Himemiya’s piece, like she had mastered and owned it for herself. It carried with it a feeling that dragged her down instead of making her feel lighter, despite the pleasant image it brought.

“When did this piano get here?” Utena asks, sitting next to Himemiya. The other girl doesn’t move over, and their hips touch, and Utena has the strange sensation of feeling her body without really feeling her; it’s similar to the sensation of needing prescription lenses but only wearing one contact, seeing but also being unable to see at the same time.

“It was here when I came down,” Himemiya answers.

“Do you think someone delivered it? That someone knows we’re here?”

“Do you think that we’re here at all?”

No immediate response. It’s true that they’re alone in this run-down house, and Utena feels at ease with the other girl at her side, but there’s still one thing weighing on her mind from yesterday: the coffins in the backyard.

However, there’s a part of her that’s afraid to acknowledge the potential reality, so instead, she says, “There’s something strange about this place…it feels real, but also not real. Like we’re together here, sitting by this piano, talking and listening, but also that none of this exists at the same time.”

“I get the same feeling.”

Utena’s eyes find their way back to the white rose; it’s started to wither, losing a bit of its brightness. _Everything in this house…_

“Utena.” Himemiya’s voice refocuses her attention, and she looks at the other girl’s serene face and quiet smile. Her features, so delicate and soft, so reassuring—there’s something about her that makes Utena want to hold her close and protect her, all the while knowing that even if she held her she wouldn’t be able to _really_ hold her, not like this.

“Would you like to hear the song again?”

Utena smiles—that’s right; regardless of how this piano came to be, or how they got here, or what this house is or means, they’re sitting here together. Utena isn’t alone, not like back then in those hazy memories of loneliness that stay buried in some part of her mind.

She is not alone in a coffin by herself.

Himemiya’s fingertips rest lightly on the bone-keys of the piano. “I would,” Utena says, “I’d like to hear anything you want to play. I want to hear it because it’s yours, and you like it. I’m…” She takes the white rose in her hands. “I’m happiest when I’m with you, after all.”

Himemiya’s eyes widen almost imperceptibly, a split-second of shock appearing on her face before it settles into her usual smile. She starts playing the tune again, saying, “I _do_ like this piece. It’s nice to play.”

Utena closes her eyes, smiling, feeling the girl beside her move as she plays the nostalgic tune. “A sunlit garden, huh… I hope someday the sun shines here. And we can have an actual garden to take care of. I think you’d look best in a garden of roses.”

“That’s nice of you to say. I think you’d look best atop a white horse with a sword.”

“I mean it,” Utena insists.

“I do, too.”

“I feel like I’ve seen you in one, before, though,” Utena continues. “I feel like I’ve known you before. That we’ve been…together, before.”

The music stops abruptly. Himemiya’s fingertips are resting on the keys she was about to press, her eyes cast downward. “I feel the same,” Himemiya agrees, looking only at the untouched keys. “It feels like a far-off dream, but I remember…azure eyes, paler than the sky; a delicate but strong hand, reaching for me; water droplets, clear as crystal, on my cheeks…” Himemiya’s eyes wander back to Utena, searching her as if to find something that isn’t there. “…Although perhaps it was only a dream.”

Utena looks at the rose in her hands; it’s ghost-white, a fleeting fragment of what it was this morning, yet still beautiful, still here in her palms.  “A dream, huh…maybe this is all a dream, and we only exist in dreams together.”  _Maybe we dream so we can meet, because this is the only world we can meet in. Maybe we dream to escape our coffins, our fragile weed-tangled prisons in lonely, dusty backyards._

“Maybe.”

Himemiya's fingers continue the soft tune again, something resolute instead of melancholy in her playing, now. Utena closes her eyes again. She can almost smell the scent of roses, of soil and watering cans and steel faucets. She can almost feel a delicate lightness and warmth spread across her cheeks.

“…I hope the sun shines tomorrow,” she says.

 

* * *

 

Her eyes pry themselves open as she sits up in a flash, clutching the bed sheets—she feels strange, or rather, she feels strange because she can _feel_. The room is cold—freezing, rather—and she gathers the blankets up close to her, shivering. Her body is still translucent, and she’s still empty, but the chill creeps into her, making her uncomfortable.

Frost decorates the sole window in the room—she takes a look outside, and sure enough, the sun is shining brightly. Yet her heart feels heavy.

_The sun is shining, but it’s so cold…it’s so cold…_

_I wanted the sun to come out. So why is it so—?_

The walls are covered with thermometers, but none of them appear to be working properly. The mercury inside them is all frozen; none of them show a high temperature, but it’s not like she needed them to tell her, anyway.

The now-pink vanity is different today, too. It lies against a flower wallpaper wall. Half the mirror is now in the place that was once vacant. She slowly steps into its view and gasps.

There are at least a hundred swords piercing her back.

She falls to her knees and lets out a distressed cry. She can’t feel them, not as she is now, at least, but the memory of the pain momentarily cripples her, and the mental weight of what’s she’s remembered keeps her pinned to the ground.

Those feelings of _almost_ that she’d had recently now feel like a rush coursing through her; there is no almost anymore; the blades from her past have brought memories surging forth, and she is suddenly all too aware of their situation.

_I have to find Himemiya._

She pulls herself up off her knees, her legs still shaking, and walks through the painted white door, across the hallway now lined with colorful picture frames, down the polished glossy stairs. The piano from yesterday is gone; the kitchen is unaccompanied as well, although the water is running in the marble sink.

_Himemiya, Himemiya._

_Where is Himemiya?_

She’s taking in all the details, desperate, overwhelmed. This house isn’t empty. It can’t be empty as long as she’s still here. The sun is shining today, so she still has to be here, the sun can’t glow without her here. Himemiya can’t be gone in a house as beautiful as this.

She tries the front door—the only door she hasn’t dared to open at least once—and upon opening it finds her fears are confirmed.

There is nothing on the other side but pitch-white oblivion.

This house is as much of a ghost as they are, existing in a specific time and space removed from any physical, tangible reality.

But she knew that this morning when her memories recovered, knew everything that transpired and led them here, and rather than the truth, her mind remained on one thing and one thing only:

Himemiya.

She returns to the kitchen and passes through the slider door out into the backyard. The sun is so bright that it’s almost blinding, and it takes her eyes a while to adjust. The wind is sharp and the air is still cold, still chilling, but the grass has turned a brilliant green under her feet, and once she no longer has to squint she can see that the scenery is not at all what it once was.

The vines and weeds that once tangled the coffins still cover them, but have now grown into beautiful bushels of roses, full and red and lovely as can be. Fit for the silk hair of a princess or the front pocket of a dandy.

In front of the wooden one is Himemiya, her back to Utena, and she breathes a sigh of relief, her heart soaring as she takes her side in front of the glass one. She wants nothing more than to take the girl’s hand, but her memories momentarily chain her, and she’s hesitant. She wonders briefly if she can be forgiven, but knows now that there’s no meaning in forgiveness, not here, not anymore. They’re both on equal footing, cognizant now of all that’s transpired, and one of them needs to break the silence.

At first, nothing.  
Then, one hand reaches for the other.  
Fingers intertwine, and Utena breathes:

“We died that day, didn’t we?”

A tight squeeze in response.

“You fell…and I couldn’t reach you, and now we’re—”

“Utena.” Himemiya’s voice is startlingly sharp; Utena widens her eyes a little, and focuses on Himemiya’s face. Her eyes, now a tinted emerald, are sincere when she says,

“We’re not in our coffins anymore.”

Utena’s not sure how it happens—this isn’t her real body, after all—but tears start to run in rivulets down her cheeks, and she can’t help it, can’t put a dam on her own emotions. She’s slightly ashamed—she’s never read of a story of a prince who cries, but after all, all of this—all of this doesn’t feel like such a terrible thing, despite the circumstances.

“Do you…do you really think this is okay, Himemiya?” Utena says, gripping her hand tighter. “Couldn’t we have done something else? Couldn’t there have been something else we could’ve done?”

“Perhaps, yes. If we weren’t so foolish…but, Utena, I never told you…”

“Told me what…?”

Himemiya leans up, gently kissing Utena’s tears, brushing them away with the gentlest of touches. “I’m happiest when I’m with you, too. As long as we’re together…”

“As long as we’re together…?

“Someday, together, we’ll shine.”

 _Someday, together… Or now, together._ “We’re not in our coffins,” Utena repeats, smiling faintly as she holds the other girl’s face between her hands. “We’re free, now. The sun is out. We’re alone, and we’re free, and we can shine together, _today_.

“We have each other, if only in dreams,” Utena says, touching her forehead to Himemiya’s, and the other girl wraps her arms around her waist.

 _And now we are nothing but wisps of what we once were, outlines of a drawing, a reflection in the water that breaks and ripples with the slightest contact._ Utena looks into Himemiya’s eyes, which were once such a deep green, but now are merely flower petals that have been washed out, leaving only streaks and hints of its original vividness. Without thinking she holds her breath, afraid that if she breathes too deeply she’ll inhale Himemiya’s fragile, airy body and they’ll disappear even though they’re both already gone with nothing to lose.

But the scenery around them is changing, growing vibrant. The vines turned into roses, the dust turned into polish, the house turned into a home. They, too, will grow and glow in time.

“Even if we’re like this, we have each other,” Anthy echoes.

“And today, we can shine.”

 

* * *

 

Perhaps the girl dreamed too much, lost in ideals of triumph and happily-ever-afters, sun-kissed mornings with the greenest of lawns decorated with grass-tears, a loving home with a warm smile waiting for her.

Perhaps the girl failed because she dreamed too much, unable to see reality and bring her ideals forthwith, unable to be the hero, destined only to become a page in a book.

The girl dreamed, and found a love that transcends time, an external heart to call home, an eternal hope in two sets of eyes that made her swell with pride and happiness.

The girl dreamed.

But was that really such a bad idea?


End file.
